Pew Sheet - Forth Sunday of Epiphany - 28th January 2007
‘Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.’
Collect
God our creator, who in the beginning commanded the light to shine out of darkness: we pray that the light of the glorious gospel of Christ may dispel the darkness of ignorance and unbelief, shine into the hearts of all your people, and reveal the knowledge of your glory in the face of Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
First reading - Ezekiel 43.27-44.4
The Lord said to Ezekiel: 27 ‘When these days are over, then from the eighth day onward the priests shall offer upon the altar your burnt offerings and your offerings of well-being; and I will accept you, says the Lord GOD.’
1) Then he brought me back to the outer gate of the sanctuary, which faces east: and it was shut.
2) The Lord said to me: This gate shall remain shut: it shall not be opened, and no one shall enter by it; for the Lord, the God of Israel, has entered by it; therefore it shall remain shut.
3) Only the prince, because he is a prince, may sit in it to eat food before the Lord: he shall enter by way of the vestibule of the gate and shall go out by the same way.
4) Then he brought me by way of the north gate to the front of the temple; and I looked, and lo! the glory of the Lord filled the temple of the Lord: and I fell upon my face.
Please join in the Psalm refrain:
Great is the Lord and highly to be praised
Second reading - 1 Corinthians 13.1-13
1) If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
2) And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.
3) If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
4) Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
5) It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;
6) it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.
7) It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8) Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end.
9) For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part;
10) but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end.
11) When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.
12) For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.
13) And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
Gospel alleluia:
Gospel - Luke 5.1-11
1) While Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God,
2) he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets.
3) He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.
4) When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.’
5) Simon answered, ‘Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.’
6) When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break.
7) So they signalled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink.
8) But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!’
9) For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken;
10) and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.’
11) When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed Jesus.
Post-communion
Generous Lord, in word and eucharist we have proclaimed the mystery of your love: help us so to live out our days that we may be signs of your wonders in the world; through Jesus Christ our Saviour.